Closure of Chicago's Crawford, Fisk electric plants ends coal era

Plants were the last coal-fired electric generating plants in a major U.S. city

August 30, 2012|By Julie Wernau | Tribune staff reporter

Soccer players play a pick up game at Benito Juarez Community Academy in shadow of the Fisk Generating Station in Chicago's Pilsen neighborhood on Wednesday. (Jos? M. Osorio/Chicago Tribune)

The Fisk power plant, in service since 1903, burned its final batch of coal Thursday while its sister plant Crawford shut down by Wednesday, ending Chicago's run as the only major U.S. city with two coal plants operating in its borders.

Their closings, confirmed by owner Midwest Generation, eliminate Chicago's two biggest industrial sources of carbon dioxide emissions, which contribute to global warming. At their peak the plants supplied power to roughly 1 million homes.

"This marks a turning point from Chicago's reliance on two highly polluting coal plants that use fuel from out of state to a cleaner energy future that's less polluting and uses more Illinois wind and other clean resources," said Howard Learner, executive director of the Environmental Law and Policy Center in Chicago.

The plant closings came after Midwest Generation declined to invest in expensive upgrades to meet federal air standards. In the last 2 1/2 years, 120 of the country's 520 coal-fired generating plants have been shuttered because the needed environmental retrofits were deemed financially impractical.

"While the retirements of Fisk and Crawford certainly are part of that trend, coal overall remains critical to ensuring that we have a reliable and affordable supply of electricity, and Midwest Generation and others are continuing to invest in plants that we believe can remain viable for many years to come," said Midwest Generation spokesman Douglas McFarlan.

Fisk, built in 1903, and Crawford, built in 1924, also had been targeted by both grassroots and national environmental groups which blamed their pollution for a variety of illnesses in the primarily Latino populations in the Little Village and Pilsen neighborhoods where the plants are located.

Midwest Generation had vigorously defended its environmental record, saying that the communities around the plants have lower asthma rates that many other Chicago neighborhoods and that other factors are contributing.

Kim Wasserman, coordinator for Little Village Environmental Justice Organization, said the closings show that communities can stop polluters in their own back yard, and that environmentalists can now focus on other coal-burning power plants. "It's not just us, it's hundreds of other communities who are fighting this," Wasserman said.

The end of the line for the plants also came as a result of technology improvements including recent upgrades to area transmission lines that made it possible to move electric power long distances. Low priced natural gas also has been a factor in making coal plants less profitable.

Many of the workers at Fisk and Crawford had worked at those plants for decades and are replacing younger workers at plants elsewhere in Midwest General's fleet in Illinois under a seniority system established by the union.

In total, Midwest Generation said 200 layoffs and retirements are expected across its fleet of Illinois plants. At Fisk and Crawford, 40 people are retiring with severance packages negotiated by the union, said company spokeswoman Susan Olavarria. In addition, she said 15 people are being laid off and 95 others have landed positions at other company plants.

At Crawford, Daniel Morales was part of a skeleton crew of eight men who shut down the plant Tuesday night.

Morales said his unit manager became emotional and was unable to issues orders. Another man stepped in to take over. "He couldn't even bark it out," said Morales, who worked at the plant for 28 years.

Mike Hanrahan, the station director for both Fisk and Crawford, said it will take about six weeks to completely cease operations at the plants. He said oil needs to be drained from pipes and that conveyor belts that were used to pull coal into plant's fuel bunkers will be removed. Chemicals will be hauled off and every surface will be washed, he said, and the water used will also be treated.

Midwest Generation also owns and operates the Powerton (Pekin), Waukegan and Will County (Romeoville) power generation plants and must meet state-imposed to reduce mercury emissions by 90 percent by 2015 and gradually decrease other pollutants by 2019. Federal regulations may move up those deadlines.

Analysts predict the company will shutter multiple generating units at its Joliet Station and Waukegan Station plants, eliminating about 40 percent of its power generation in the state. The company has until 2014 to clean up Waukegan or shut it down.

Midwest Generation may need to file for bankruptcy protection, its parent company said last month.

Hanrahan said a crew composed of people who are either retiring or being laid off have agreed to stay on to help ready for mothballing. Ultimately, a security crew will take over to prevent scavengers from trying to haul away metal.

"There's a lot of homeless people around the area that like to get into things so we want to make sure that nobody's getting into the buildings," Hanrahan said.